Warmth
by E. Gray
Summary: A vignette. "Oh, and he thinks he's ending their lives. He has no idea what he's doing to hers."


"**Warmth"**

At night, she can hear him scream.

A quick, wordless explosion; almost like a bark, just loud enough to reach her through the floorboards and trusses separating his bedroom above from the empty air above her bed. That sound, tangible as a pair of cold white hands, reaching out even through her sleep to shake her awake, like a desperate call she cannot answer. He wouldn't _want_ her to answer.

Tonight she hears him scream, that short burst like a breath caught on a sob, presumably on waking. It slices through the ardent moan of the night wind, reaches her ears. She briefly imagines him bolting upright in bed, slicked in a cold sweat. It's a few minutes before she hears the hollow echo of his footsteps, rising from bed, crossing the room. Tonight there is a fit of coughing, smothered behind something, a hand or a washcloth. He isn't well lately. It's gotten cold out, and the fool doesn't sleep enough, doesn't eat enough. Hasn't been taking care of himself, of course, but she barely expects him to, barely knows what to expect from him on any given day.

She tightens her fists around the pilled flannel sheets, inches her feet closer to the tin, coal-filled warmer at the foot of the bed, touches it tentatively with her big toe. It's cooled enough now to wrap her bare feet up against the warm metal, just for a moment, just a tease of incredible, tingling warmth before having to pull away.

Yes, a tease. He is a terrible tease. Just one, bare, unguarded glance from his eyes before the prison walls snap back down to shut her out, ah, it's enough to keep her chasing after him in his less agreeable moments with extra blankets, soup, anything she knows how to give that he might need. Oh, she can't help herself. She knows she makes a right fool out of herself day after day, dragging along behind him like a shadow; like a dog at his feet, and yet, something as small as a half-smile, a thank-you, a moment of playing along with her game of endless chatter, oh, it only makes her sickness grow worse. She'll do anything, anything he asks. Already has. Already spends her days doing the unthinkable because it helps him. Already cleans up every horrific mess he makes with his praises of her bloody brilliance echoing in her ears.

There has been benefit in it for her, she can't deny it. As she listens to the silence from up above, she pushes herself deeper into the patched, goose-down pillow. Their…arrangement… had garnered her more business than she could handle, almost. Enough to put some money away, at least. Funny, enough that she could afford proper meat now, if she wanted. Who knew if the pies would sell as well if she changed the secret ingredient to something more pedestrian? Maybe that wasn't funny. Not the kind of funny anyone would laugh at.

Even so, she can't stop now. Because _he_ can't stop now. She wants…needs to be the reason he makes it out the other side…to the other side of this dark passage where he _can_ stop, when he'll be assuaged. Until then, she'll reap the small rewards she can get from him. A smile, a low chuckle, his hot breath ghosting across her neck, a shared glance, a vicious smirk with his eyes on her as a new customer starts up the stairs to his parlor. That nasty grin that forecasts doom, it should chill her body cold with terror and instead ignites it with an ungovernable flame. Surely, there is something wrong with her but oh, his dark, fatal eyes riveted on hers with his lips in that malevolent curl; she can pretend the devastating black fantasy that gaze promises is about pinning her wet, twisting body under his, instead of a lake of garnet blood rushing out under his fingertips. Oh, she knows better, but her imagination…she can't always control it.

Footsteps upstairs snap her attention back to the ceiling. He crosses again, slowly, the boards creaking under his weight. Her imagination is running wild already. Her bed is warm, her pan of coals creeping heat up her bare legs, and she's imagining a different sort of bed warmer. Half-dreaming him up into her bed, divested of his waistcoat and stock, rough hands on her body and slipping under her night shift to follow the curve of her hip and the valley of her waist, the scalding brush of his lips, humid breath on her collarbone, her hands tangling in the black shock of his hair and pulling him down…

More coughing from upstairs throws cold water on her fancy and she scowls up into the dark air. Somehow, she never gets used to the painful disappointment at every, however vague, rejection she experiences, caught in his thrall as she is. Every day, when his eyes snap away; when he pushes her pack into her proper place, she feels the cut of his razor and dies a little, and all the same is resurrected by a simple uttering of her name, no matter how insignificant. Her heart rises and falls at his mood. Oh, and he thinks he's ending _their_ lives. He has no idea what he's doing to hers.

He's still coughing. It's awfully cold tonight. Damp and windy as all hell, drafty in that attic apartment and he hasn't built a fire in the corner stove. Should she bring him a tisane? Maybe thyme, for that cough? Has he been using the extra blankets she brought him? If he has, she can't wait to collect them for laundering: she'll use that blanket the rest of her life, smelling him in the material night after night to aid her limitless imagination in the only warmth he'll ever unknowingly give her. Curious. The thought of it makes her feel pathetic and excited all at once.

Her eyelids grow heavy again. She squints at the moony face of the clock by the pale square of the window, and can see nothing but a quivering jumble of barbed numbers. Can't see a bloody thing in the dark anyway. She turns her back to the clock, flopping onto her left side to resign herself to sleep.


End file.
